Tarkov Arena’s Esports Scene Continues With Arena Cup Series

Escape From Tarkov

June 8, 2024

Grant Taylor-Hill

Escape from Tarkov: Arena was released in December 2023 alongside a €100,000 tournament at DreamHack Hannover. It was a rampant success and brought a stack of visibility to the new session-based multiplayer platform built and fleshed out by Battlestate Games. Now that a little time has passed, it looks as though ‘BSG’ is stoking the embers of an esports scene for Tarkov Arena once again, officially revealing the Arena Cup Series.

This all-new esports series has been created in collaboration with HUNT Premier, the most recognisable tournament organiser in the Escape from Tarkov landscape. Per a recent release, it was confirmed that 16 teams from CIS and Europe will compete across a series of challenges for a €25,000 prize pool. It’s quite a comedown from the €100,000 tournament that kicked things off last year, but it’s better than nothing!

Tarkov Arena Cup Series Revealed

tarkov cup series

Battlestate Games didn’t go all-out with the announcement that finally revealed something for Arena’s esports ecosystem. It was a case of posting a message on Twitter with a schedule and a basic explanation of how the Arena Cup Series will work when it debuts later in 2024.

The ‘top 16 teams’ are yet to be confirmed and it’s not known if they’ll have to qualify for the Cup Series or if they’ve been invited by Battlestate Games to compete. In December, GamerLegion won the inaugural Tarkov Arena tournament, but the team wasn’t sure if it would hang around to see what came next.

Here’s the full schedule for the Tarkov Arena Cup Series:

Group Stage:

Using a Swiss System format

June 14 at 6 PM BST
June 15 at 4 PM BST
June 16 at 4 PM BST
June 21 at 6 PM BST

Playoff Stage:

June 22 at 4 PM BST
June 23 at 4 PM BST

The action will unfold on Battlestate Games’ Twitch channel, and the entire Cup Series will be played online – it’s not expected that a LAN environment will be stood up for this. There are high expectations that this will be the first in many Cup Series events that surface in the Tarkov space. Since being released in December 2023, Tarkov Arena has failed to secure significant traction, and the recent drama surrounding The Unheard Edition knocked Escape from Tarkov down a peg or two.

With competition surfacing in the form of Arena Breakout: Infinite and Gray Zone Warfare, Tarkov has had a rough time of late. This will undoubtedly help.

For more Escape from Tarkov news, stay tuned to Esports.net